


The Outing

by acerbitas



Category: Breaking Bad
Genre: Death Threats, Keeping people in pits, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Psychological Torture, Threats
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-03-31
Updated: 2014-03-31
Packaged: 2018-01-17 16:01:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,343
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1393738
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/acerbitas/pseuds/acerbitas
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Todd decides to take Jesse out to breakfast at his uncle's house.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Outing

The first night Todd came down into the pit, it was cold.  Jesse hadn’t expected company.  He’d curled up in a corner, hands stuck in his hoodie’s pockets for warmth. _  
_

When he first saw Todd up above, he thought he was imagining it.  Todd peered down at him from above, his mismatched smile wide.  No hallucination could imitate that smile.  Todd tossed a blanket at his prisoner’s face.  Jesse looked up balefully, but wrapped the gift around him anyway.  It was too cold to reject; he didn’t want to freeze during the night.  Freeze and live, that was.  Dying was another matter.

He expected Todd to leave then, but instead he climbed down into the pit with him.  Jesse eyed the gun that hung from the other man’s hip.

“I brought you some snack mix,” Todd said.  He held out a new bag of Chex, gleaming in the moonlight.

“Okay.”  Jesse wanted Todd to go away, because shit, he was so lonely he couldn’t take it.  That didn’t make sense, but it was true anyway.

“You don’t like Chex?”

“It’s fine.”  Jesse reached out his hand and took the bag, but didn’t open it.

“What _do_ you like?” Todd sounded like a boy scout, trying to help an aged patron at the food bank.

Jesse didn’t know what to say.  He knew what he liked, but the thought of Funions and Cheetos and all the things he used to eat made the empty hole in his chest get bigger.

Todd shrugged.  There was silence, until an owl hooted.

“I like Funions.”

“That’s cool.  I’ll bring some to you sometime.” Todd sat down in his pit.  He was too far away to touch, even if Jesse tried.

 Todd’s promise was also a sentence: you will stay down here, forever, and I will give you snacks as long as you behave.  Jesse started to chuckle; he couldn’t help it.  In his new world, Todd was sane and Jesse was nuts.

Todd watched him like an eight-year-old watches an ant burst into flame.

The Chex Mix reminded Jesse of his parent’s cupboards.  They’d always put the snacks up high so Jesse couldn’t reach.  When he was good, he would get some.

“What do you want?” Jesse asked finally.

“I thought you might want some company.”

Jesse wanted to say he wouldn’t need any company if he wasn’t trapped in a pit, but he didn’t.  “I’m good, thanks.” He pulled his legs up to his chest.

Todd ignored him.  “You know, I know how to cook now.  I’m just as good as you.  We don’t need you anymore.”

“Great.  Good for you.  Then why don’t you kill me?”  Jesse’s finger’s trembled as he clenched them against his legs.

“I’m protecting you.”

“Why?”

Todd smiled his choir boy smile.  “I like you.”

 “Okay,” Jesse said.  He wanted Todd to leave him alone so badly that he was afraid he was going to scream.

 “Don’t you like me too?”

“Uh,” Jesse said.  Todd’s bizzaro world descend into his pit like a Stephen King apparition.  Any moment a clown would leap into the pit with them.  Jesse imagined the clown beating Todd to death.  “Sure.”

“Then you should come with me tomorrow.”

“Come where?  I don’t need to go anywhere.”  Jesse smiled at him thinly.  “This place is a fucking hotel.”

Todd plowed through his captive’s sarcasm.  “For breakfast.  At my uncle’s house.”

Jesse was sure that Todd was mocking him now, but he had to play along.  “Aren’t you afraid I’ll run away?”

“Of course not.”  Todd’s voice was jovial.  He reached into his pocket, and out came a picture of Brock.  He was in a little black suit; his face was peaked.  “We’ll have a good time.”

“Sure,” Jesse agreed, voice cracking.  He reached for the picture, hoping, wanting, but Todd pulled it back.  It disappeared into his pocket.

“Can I have the picture?”

“No.”  Todd still managed to sound angelic.

“Why not?”  Jesse felt tears stirring, and he wiped his face with a grimy sleeve.

Todd’s eyes were reptilian in the moonlight.  “You don’t need it.”

“I don’t need to go to a diner with you either.” Jesse pursed his lips, and tried to slow his breathing.  Was Todd trying to provoke him, right before they went to breakfast?  _Why?_

“Yeah, but that’s something, you know, I wanna do.”

“Well, you’re a cunt.”  The tears came again, but this time so hot and fast he couldn’t fight them.  “You’re a fucker.  You’re a, a—”  Words to describe Todd failed him.  Todd was beyond description.

“I’m not the one cursing.”

 _Oh my God,_ Jesse thought.  _Sometimes he makes me think I’m going insane._

There was a pregnant silence.  Jesse clenched his fists so hard that blood dribbled down his wrists.

“Why don’t you have some Chex Mix and try to calm down?”

The suggestion was almost obscene.  “Not hungry.  I’ll go with you, now fuck off.”

“You are being rude,” Todd said.  “I don’t know why you have to be rude all the time.”

Jesse had almost forgotten how to laugh, but for some reason, that really got him going.  He leaned his head against his knees and laughed until snot ran out of his nose.  He wiped it on his sleeve.

“I don’t get it.”

“You don’t get _anything_ then,” Jesse told him.  “Shit, man, how do you watch TV?  Aren’t you wondering why the good guys always lose?  Is that’s what it’s like in Todd Land?”

Todd shrugged; he wasn’t offended, only amused.  “You think I’m some kind of _monster._ ”

“Well, think about the view from where I am.”

“You’ll come to like me in time.”  Todd seemed sure of that, so much so that it made Jesse’s stomach squirm.

“No,” Jesse said, “I won’t.”  He felt reckless.  _Fuck it,_ he thought, _beat me or starve me.  I don’t care._

“We’ll see.”

Jesse thought about strangling Todd.  “Is that picture…of the funeral?”

“Yes.”

Jesse nearly gagged.  “You’re watching him.”

“Enough to know where he is.  Enough to do what we would have to do.”

“I don’t understand.”  Jesse felt like screaming, but his words came out soft.  “Why you care anymore.  About my life or his life or anything.  Just cook for yourself, and let me die.”

Todd shrugged.  “It’s easier for me to cook with a partner.  And you’re cool enough.”

Jesse wasn’t sure if he hated Todd or Walt more; he had love for Walt, though, tucked away.  But he feared Todd, and when he was lonely, he wanted him to come.  It was too hard to be alone.

“Thanks.”

“So…see you tomorrow?  I’ll get you a bath, some clothes.”  Todd stood up, rubbing his dirt-stained jeans as he did so.

 “Yeah, whatever.”

“Cool.”  Todd smiled; he looked like a preacher’s son when he wore that smile.  “It’ll be fun.”

Jesse had nothing to say to that.  Climbing out of the pit, Todd waved at him before pulling up his ladder.  Jesse gritted his teeth and dug his fingernails into his palms.  _He knows I won’t try to escape,_ he thought, _as long as Brock stays alive, they have me.  I’m stuck forever._

It was going to be an awful night.  Lately Jesse had been stricken with insomnia.  It made him think about getting high, so he could forget all of the awful things he had done.  There were so many of them that they cluttered his brain.  He also tried to think about ways to escape, and ways to survive, but he was buried, and buried alone.

He had considered asking Todd for something to take the edge off; surely a stupefied prisoner was easier to contain.  But his pride had made him reconsider so far.  He wondered how long he’d hold out, and he wondered when he would die.

Reaching for the Chex Mix, Jesse opened the bag.  The salt felt good on his tongue, and he ate more, and more, never feeling like he was full.  He didn’t think tomorrow’s meal was going to make him feel any different.


End file.
